This invention relates to a method and an apparatus for automatically composing or generating a program for conducting computer-based sequential control of operations which are to be effected by equipment for a production line. This program is written and output as, for example, a ladder program.
A method of controlling a production line such as a motor vehicle assembly line is known which uses a sequential control unit incorporating a computer to effect sequential control of various equipment units provided for the production line with respect to operations which are to be successively effected by the equipment. To perform such sequential control, the computer incorporated in the sequential control unit is loaded with a sequential control program, and successively conducts steps of control of the operations of equipment units provided along the production line in accordance with the sequential control program.
For composition of a computer program provided as a sequential control program used for such a sequential control system, a great deal of labor is ordinarily required. It is therefore desirable to reduce process steps for composing the program. From this viewpoint, computer program automation has been proposed such as described in Japanese Patent Laid-Open 63-106004, and Japanese Patent Publication 1-28962.
In the computer program automation apparatus previously proposed, however, even though a computer is provided, automatic formation of a sequential control program using the computer depends comparatively greatly upon manual operations such as data input operations, and the number of composition steps cannot be reduced sufficiently.